Conventionally, a type of a known solar simulator is such that flash light, which is emitted from a xenon lamp, is irradiated to the photovoltaic devices as the pseudo sunlight in case of measuring characteristics of electric current voltage of the photovoltaic devices.
Patent Document 1 discloses a technology, in which a power supply circuit with multiple condensers, which are connected in parallel via coils, is utilized to a flatten flash light irradiance waveform emitted from the xenon lamp and to secure the measuring time for the characteristics of the photovoltaic devices.
Also, Patent Document 2 discloses a technology of using a power supply circuit with a capacitor, which outputs electric discharge sustaining voltage, to make the xenon lamp to emit long pulse and to secure the measuring time for the characteristics of the photovoltaic devices.
Furthermore, Patent Document 3 discloses a technology for maintaining a continuous lighting xenon lamp at low irradiance and controlling the same to be high irradiance to measure the characteristics of the photovoltaic devices at a flat portion of the irradiance waveform.    [Patent Document 1] Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-088419    [Patent Document 2] Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2007-128861    [Patent Document 3] Japanese Patent No. 2886215
However, Patent Document 1 has the following problems:    (1) when the power supply circuit employed in Patent Document 1 is used, in order to make the flash light emitted from the lamp into a predetermined irradiance waveform, detail configuration of the power supply circuit such as the number and capacity of condensers need to be defined. Also, whenever the irradiance waveform is attempted to be changed, the configuration of the power supply circuit needs to be redefined; and    (2) in order to flatten the irradiance waveform, numerous coils and condensers are needed to be arranged, which increases the cost thereof and requires a large space.
Also, when the power supply circuit employed in Patent Document 2 is used, since general electric current control circuits generate a withstand pressure problem, luminous voltage of the lamp needs to be low. The lamp can be short for lowering the luminous voltage of the lamp; however, a shorter lamp makes it difficult to secure sufficient quantity of light. In addition, when attempting to secure the sufficient quantity of light with the short lamp, the large amount of electric current is required, and therefore general electric current control circuits becomes incapable of performing satisfactory.
Furthermore, when measuring the characteristics of the photovoltaic devices utilizing continuous emission as in Patent Document 3, emission for a long period of time shortens the life of lamp and optical parts.